Top 9 Twitter Clients for Ubuntu Linux

I rushed to the Synaptic Package Manager hoping to find some Twitter client applications (apps) right away but very unfortunately none were listed there. Then I did a little research and found some good Twitter clients for Linux that work on Ubuntu.

1. Twitux (download)

Twitux is a Twitter client for the Gnome desktop. The program features include view public, friends and mine timeline, send message, automatic login, add friend and system tray icon.

2. gTwitter (download)

gTwitter a simple GTK+ based application for Linux, designed to interact with Twitter web service. Its written using Mono/C# and some of GNOME dependant libraries. GUI is inspired by Mac client Twitterrific.

3. Spaz (download)

Spaz is a Twitter client for users who value free, open-source software, attractive design, and customizability. It is built entirely in XHTML and Javascript and can be styled using a custom CSS styling file. It is built on the Adobe AIR framework so to install it all you need to have is Adobe AIR on Ubuntu (See the end of the post for this tutorial)

4. Twhirl (download)

Twhirl is a desktop twitter client, based on the Adobe AIR platform. It is one of my favorite Twitter clients as it really very easy to use. Scroll down to see how to get this app working using Adobe AIR on Ubuntu.

5. TwitterFox (download)

TwitterFox is a Firefox Extension that displays updates from your friends and lets you update your status. This extension adds a tiny icon on the status bar that notifies you when your friends update their tweets. Also it has a small text input field to update your tweets. As Ubuntu already comes preinstalled with Firefox so installing this Twitter app is as easy as a pie.

6. Twitter Deskbar (download)

Twitter Deskbar is a Twitter app that integrates with the Gnome Deskbar and lets you post status updates right from your desktop. The installation requires you to have Deskbar widget for Gnome. For detailed instructions please use the download link provided.

7. Twitter Terminal

This is basically a hack for posting to Twitter using the Linux Terminal. You will need cURL ( a client for getting files from servers) to post to Twitter through the Terminal which can be installed using the following command:
sudo apt-get install curl

With cURL installed, you can post to Twitter from the terminal window by using the following syntax:
curl -u yourusername:yourpassword -d status="Your Message Here" http://twitter.com/statuses/update.xml

You will receive a response containing the XML coding for your post which acts as a confirmation that your post was submitted.

8. Alert Thingy (download)

Alert Thingy is basically an Adobe AIR app for FriendFeed but also works for Twitter as well. You can get status updates from your friends and can also post live status updates yourself.

9. Mitter ( Download)

Among mitter features are :

• clean interface: simple and easy to use
• supports docking on systray
• nicely integrated with GNOME desktop
• has console client

Bonus for Ubuntu users : mitter is also available from GetDeb.net one-click-install portal

All of these apps work brilliantly on Ubuntu so you are good to go with any one of these.